TOWSON, Md. – Two games adorn the Towson University women's volleyball schedule this weekend as the Tigers make a Southern Swing through the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) for week three of league play.

Weekly Schedule
Thursday, Oct. 4 | Towson at Elon | 7 p.m.
Saturday, Oct. 6 | Towson at William & Mary | 7 p.m.
 
Broadcast Information
Both matches will be streamed live and free through the host schools' website. On Thursday, Elon's Thomas Castle and Drew Gentry will have the call, while William & Mary will see Russ Beisswanger behind the microphone. Links for live audio and video, as well as live stats, can be found on TowsonTigers.com.

First Serve
Towson continues its road swing this week with a pair of matches, first taking on Elon Thursday evening in North Carolina, followed by a trip to Williamsburg for a showdown with the Tribe of William & Mary.

In The National Rankings
Neither team was ranked nor mentioned in the polls this week.

Scouting the Road-Swinging Tigers
Towson is in the midst of its longest true road stretch to date, taking on Elon Thursday in the second of three-straight matches on the road. Towson fell in its most recent outing at James Madison, falling 3-1 after trailing 2-0. Towson saw the return of rookie Emily Jarome on Saturday after missing the Hofstra match with a lowerody injury. Jarome continues her team-lead in kills with 175 across 61 sets (2.87 per set). Senior Jocelyn Kuilan is second on the team with 165 kills, averaging 2.58 in her 64 sets this season. Olivia Finckel has 158 kills  while Annie Ertz is a fourth Tiger over 100 kills with 111. Silvia Grassini paces Towson in attack percentage, hitting .336 this season. On defense, Olamide Sonuga is averaging just shy of a block per set (0.89) with her 56 total blocks, 50 of which have been assisted. Grassini and Finckel have 47 total blocks apiece, while the latter is tied with Sonuga in block solos with six. Over the weekend, Anna Holehouse became the first player in program history, and seventh in the CAA, to surpass 2,000 career digs. She has 343 on the season and is averaging 5.36 per set this weekend.

In league play, Finckel leads Towson with 51 kills, averaging 3.40 per set. Kuilan and Jarome are tied for second with 41 kills. In four CAA matches, Holehouse has generated 71 digs, averaging 4.73 per set. Sonuga is posting better than one block per set in CAA matches to date.

Scouting the Host Phoenix
Elon enters Thursday's match with an overall record of 8-6 and sits at 0-3 in CAA matches. Most recently, the Phoenix fell in five sets on the road at Northeastern on Sunday. Kam Terry leads the Phoenix with 182 kills, averaging 3.87 per set. She is the only Phoenix with more than 100 kills to date. Kellyn Trowse is second with 87 total in 45 sets, a 1.93 average. Four players for Elon have more than 100 digs, paced by Maddie Jaudon's 227, a 4.37 per-set average. Natalie Cummins and Elizabeth Coil are the top blockers with 38 total and 34 total, respectively. Cummins has 30 block assists. As a team, the Phoenix are hitting .155 this season, led by Alexa Pavlick's .281. Despite a low swing percentage, Elon has held opponents to .149 on the attack this season.

Towson-Elon History
Towson and Elon will be meeting for the 11th time in program history on Thursday. The Tigers have dominated the series, holding a 9-1 all-time lead. Towson has won nine-straight matches over the Phoenix. Elon won the first-ever meeting in five sets but Towson has won every meeting since, including a perfect 8-0 mark since Elon joined the CAA for the 2014 season. Towson won the most recent matchup 3-0 in late October last season at SECU Arena. The Tigers are 4-0 on the road against Elon and sit at 5-0 at home. Elon's lone win was in Richmond, Virginia during the VCU Invitational in 1998. Towson is 1-0 all-time against Elon on Oct. 4, winning in four sets in North Carolina during the 2015 season.

Towson-Elon By the Numbers
All-Time Series Record  Towson leads 9-1
at Towson  Towson 5-0
at Elon Towson 4-0
at Neutral Sites Elon 1-0
at Unknown Sites n/a
First Meeting 1998 - Elon 3-2
Last Meeting Oct. 20, 2017
Towson 3, Elon 0 (Towson, Md.)
Streak Towson +9

Last Time Out vs. Elon | Oct. 20, 2017 | Towson, Md. | SECU Arena
It was a straight-set victory for the Tigers in their second meeting of the season against Elon, winning 25-22, 25-18, 26-24. Senior Julymar Otero turned in a triple double with 10 kills on 19 swings, 15 assists and 13 digs to pace the Tigers. Towson turned in eight total blocks, including solo efforts from Olamide Sonuga and Annie Ertz. Anna Holehouse joined Otero in double-digit kills with 10 along with six assists. For the match, Towson finished with a hitting percentage of .223 while limiting Elon to just .092. The Phoenix had a match-high 15 kills from Sydney Busa, who took 41 swings but had 10 errors.

Towson-William & Mary History
Saturday night's showdown between the Tigers and the Tribe will be the 42nd meeting all-time. Towson holds a 21-19-1 all-time lead thanks to a clean pair of 3-0 sweeps last season. In fact, the Tigers have not dropped a set against the Tribe since a 3-1 win at home on Oct. 24, 2015. The Tigers eliminated a big deficit in the series with eight-straight wins along with 12 wins in the last 14 showdowns. All-time in Williamsburg, the Tigers hold a healthy 12-3 lead. The only tie in the series came back during the two-set era in the Tigers' first varsity season in 1976.

Towson-William  By the Numbers
All-Time Series Record 21-19-1
at Towson  W&M 8-9
at William & Mary Towson 12-3
at Neutral Sites W&M 1-6
at Unknown Sites W&M 1-0-1
First Meeting 1976 - Tie 1-1
Last Meeting Oct. 22, 2017
Towson 3, William & Mary 0 (Towson, Md.)
Streak Towson +8

Last Time Out vs. William & Mary | Oct. 22, 2017 | Towson, Md. | SECU Arena
Towson put together a clean sweep of the Tribe not only in the season, winning both matches, but in shutout fashion as Towson knocked off the Tribe 3-0 in late October. The Tigers hit for .347 in the match, including .364 to open the showdown. Julymar Otero nearly completed a trible-double as she finished with 12 kills, 20 assists and eight digs. Marrisa Wonders added another 20 assists for the Tigers while Jocelyn Kuilan knocked down nine kills. Anna Holehouse finished with a match-high 14 digs and dropped in one service ace.

With a Win Thursday Towson Would...
- Halt a two-match slide in CAA action after falling 3-1 at James Madison Saturday night.
- Win its 10th-straight match over the Phoenix. Towson has lost just once against Elon, falling in five in the first meeting during the 1998 season.
- Stay in the top six of the CAA Standings. The top six teams at season's end qualify for the 2018 CAA Volleyball Tournament, hosted by Charleston.
- Win its first match away from home since a clean sweep of Xavier at the Puerto Rico Clásico on Sept. 2.
- Collect its first true road victory of the season. The Tigers are 0-2 in true road matches this season, falling at Loyola and James Madison.

2,000 Digs
Early in the Tigers' first set at James Madison, red shirt senior libero Anna Holehouse became the first player in Towson history to post 2,000 digs. She finished with match with 20 digs, bringing her career total to 2,016. She is also the seventh player in CAA history to reach the 2,000 digs mark. She trails Hofstra's Kylee Maneja's mark of 2,044 for sixth all-time in league history. To date, Holehouse has 343 digs in 2018. She needs another 386 digs to overtake the league's all-time record of 2,401, held by Delaware's Stephanie Barry.

The 20 Club
This season, six Towson players have put up a combined 26 matches in which a Tiger hits at least 20 in a respective category. Anna Holehouse leads The 20 Club with 11 matches with at least 20 digs, followed by six 20-assist matches from Kristin Spengler. Marrisa Wonders has five 20-assist matches while rookie Emily Jarome has two matches with at least 20 kills. Olivia Finckel and Peyton Moyles are the most recent additions to The 20 Club as the former put down 20 kills at James Madison while Moyles handed out 27 assists.

New Gym, Who This?
This Thursday, the Tigers will take to the court in a facility they have never played in before: Elon's brand new Schar Center. The Phoenix recently opened the Schar Center, a 160,000 square-foot, 5,100-seat facility, in the spring of 2018. The volleyball team was the first to christen the new building as Elon holds a 4-1 mark at home this season.

Sonuga Named NewDay USA Female Student-Athlete of the Week (Sept. 25)
In the first weekend of CAA action, Olamide Sonuga played all eight sets as the Tigers split their first two league matches. The Haverhill, Massachusetts native was strong at the net, finishing with nine total blocks, including a pair of solo stuffs against Northeastern. In the Tigers' CAA opener against Delaware, Sonuga assisted on six blocks. On the attack, Sonuga hit for .320, including four kills on nine swings against Delaware (.444).

Kuilan's Big Swing
Senior Jocelyn Kuilan is firmly one of the top offensive players in program history. The right sider has knocked down 1,331 kills in her career at Towson, ranking sixth all-time and is poised to become the sixth player in program history with at least 1,300 kills. She needs 21 more kills to surpass Maddie Haseltine (2005-08). April Hoffman (2002-05) leads the career records with 1,588 kills. Kuilan averages 391 kills per season, including a rookie season with 426. Kuilan will need 320 kills to take the program's career record. Kuilan continues to climb in the program's all-time sets played list. She has seen time in 426 sets, ranking among the top 20. The program's all-time mark is 481 sets played by Lindsey Flaherty (2013-16).

Challenge Yourself
The Tigers put together a strong nonconference schedule to begin the 2018 season, including a trip to the Puerto Rico Clásico and two home tournaments featuring plenty of Power 5 opponents. With the most recent Rankings Percentage Index (RPI), the Tigers sit ranked at 180 nationally. Towson's opponents combined to average 141 this season, including four foes inside the top 75: Missouri (41), Arizona State (45), Princeton (61) and Miami (72). The Tigers went 1-3 against those opponents, including a clean sweep of Miami. Towson went to five sets against two of those squads: Missouri and Princeton, and played Arizona State to extra points in all three sets, falling 28-26, 27-25, 26-24.

Tiger in the Pros
In early September, former Tiger Julymar Otero signed a professional contract to play professional volleyball for the Altay Volleyball Club in Kazakhstan. Additionally, Otero will play for the Puerto Rico National Team at the FIVB World Championship in Japan this weekend. Her native Puerto Rico opens action on Saturday against Brazil. The Puerto Rican side will also face Kazakhstan, Kenya, the Dominican Republic and Serbia in successive days. As of the morning of Oct. 3, Puerto Rico was 2-2 at the World Championships, sweeping Kazakhstan and Kenya, but falling in straight sets to Brazil and the Dominican Republic.